After its phenomenal success at this season’s award ceremonies, including winning the BAFTA for Outstanding Debut by a British Writer, Director or Producer (awarded to writers Stephen Beresford and David Livingstone), Pride finally arrives on DVD today!

'Focus' movie: Will Smith has third weakest weekend box-office debut of his career (photo: Will Smith in 'Focus') According to those referred to in polite society as "conservatives," winter storms and freezing temperatures are evidence that there's no such thing as global warming. Let's not even go there. Instead, let's focus (bad pun intended) on the Focus movie starring Will Smith and Margot Robbie as a con couple, which opened below expectations – with wintery weather as a possible culprit – in North America this weekend, February 27-March 1, 2015. According to box-office tracking, as late as a couple of days ago Warner Bros.' modestly budgeted Focus was expected to take in between $22-24 million. Barring a miracle akin to a sudden halt to rising ocean temperatures (pardon the hyperbole), that's not about to happen. Now, before I proceed: "modestly budgeted"? Well, for a Will Smith movie, $50 million – after
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Deadline also reports that Emily Blunt, who was being eyed for the villain role last month, has finalized her deal. Snow White and the Huntsman star Nick Frost is also coming back to reprise his role as the dwarf Nion. We reported last month that Nick Frost and Toby Jones couldn't come to terms with Universal about reprising their dwarf roles, and that Eddie Marsan is also not returning due to scheduling complications with Ray Donovan. The site now reports that Nick Frost and Universal "have worked it out" for him to return.
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Deadline also reports that Emily Blunt, who was being eyed for the villain role last month, has finalized her deal. Snow White and the Huntsman star Nick Frost is also coming back to reprise his role as the dwarf Nion. We reported last month that Nick Frost and Toby Jones couldn't come to terms with Universal about reprising their dwarf roles, and that Eddie Marsan is also not returning due to scheduling complications with Ray Donovan. The site now reports that Nick Frost and Universal "have worked it out" for him to return.
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This tale of half-lives and lonely deaths avoids cliched resolution to set up a genuinely touching conclusion

There are few faces more forlorn than that of Eddie Marsan in this painfully melancholic tale of half-lives and lonely deaths. He plays John May, a civil servant whose thankless job is to locate relatives of the recently deceased and perpetually unloved. To his superiors (and indeed everyone else), these poor unfortunates are just numbers, but John takes an all-too-personal interest in their passing – lovingly pasting their photos into his own family albums, while eating tuna and toast at home alone. Facing his final case, John embarks on an odyssey through the land of the living that brings him into contact with the fractured friends and acquaintances of a previously unnoticed neighbour. It’s touching stuff, Rachel Portman’s plaintive score plucking endearingly at our heartstrings, Marsan’s worried demeanour dripping with an almost Chaplinesque sense of pathos.
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★★★☆☆ In Still Life (2013), Uberto Pasolini crafts a small, but poignant and well performed tale of life and death. It revolves around a dedicated South London council employee, played with gentility and humanity by Eddie Marsan, whose job is to track down the relatives of the recently deceased. Mr. May (Marsan) is a meticulous individual utterly dedicated to his job. He may not be fast, but there's little doubt over how much he cares about getting the living to pay their respects to the dead. Day in, day out, May writes eulogies and attends the funerals of the people who have died alone in the London borough of Kennington.

The poignant story of a shy, lonely council official is sympathetically observed but ultimately sentimental

Here is a sombre, sympathetically observed, if finally sentimental movie from Italian film-maker Uberto Pasolini, known for producing The Full Monty (1997). This was made two years ago and has a small role for Joanne Froggatt – smaller than her prominent position on the poster implies. Her Golden-Globe-winning appearance in Downton Abbey may have got this film its UK release.

The drama itself could almost be a fictional footnote to Carol Morley’s great documentary Dreams of a Life (2011), which tried to reconstruct the life of a young woman who died alone in her London flat. Eddie Marsan plays John May, a shy council official living on his own, whose job is to track down the relatives of people who die alone in the borough; he can see all too clearly that he might suffer the same Eleanor-Rigby fate.
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[Editor's Note: This post is presented in partnership with Time Warner Cable Movies On Demand in support of Indie Film Month. Today's pick, "Still Life," is available now On Demand. Here's an exclusive clip.]
Uberto Pasolini "Still Life" follows the story of Jon May (Eddie Marsan), a funeral officer and public servant responsible for burying those without relatives. "As he struggles to proved dignity in death to those who had lost it in life, he tenderly writes eulogies and carefully chooses music to accompany the funerals. But he always fails in his attempts to have someone present, leaving him alone to witness his "clients'" last journeys on earth. When an unknown neighbor dies alone and friendless, John May takes on his case as a final assignment. Overcoming rejections and dead ends, he travels across the country tracking down Billy Stoke's scattered family and forgotten friends, to ensure his will not be another unattended, cheerless
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Bart was an untrained musician who couldn’t read or write music and yet became the first person to have three West End musicals running and at one point was earning more in song royalties than the Beatles. Even so, he still managed to lose it all.

Good Universe will launch international sales next week at the Berlin Film Festival.

Vadim Jean (“Breaking the Bank”) is directing the musical drama about the life of composer-lyricist Bart, best known for writing the score for “Oliver!”

Elliot Davis, whose credits include “Loserville: The Musical,” is on board to write the script. He and Martin Koch, who won a Tony for “Billy Elliot the Musical,” will write the music and original score.

Weaver will play young Bart, a prodigy who could neither read nor write music. Rush will portray the older version of the composer, who lost his fortune after backing a string of flops.

“Oliver!” was based on Charles Dickens’ “Oliver Twist” and was the first modern British musical to be transferred successfully to Broadway.
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• Penelope Cruz and Diane Kruger are in final negotiations for This Man, This Woman. Isabel Coixet is directing from a script by Frederic Raphael. The story follows Matt Heller and Martha Parks (Cruz), a former romantic item who look back on their roller coaster past when they run into each other on a plane. Kruger takes the role of a talk show host, Kirsty Sachs, who has an affair with Heller, and alters his relationship with Parks as a result. [Deadline]
• Geoffrey Rush will star as Lionel Bart in Vadim Jean's musical feature, Consider Yourself. Bart was a composer and
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The developing Oliver Twist film has nothing to do with the famous musical, but those with a love for its show tunes can take heart. Director Vadim Jean is preparing a musical biopic of Oliver!'s composer and lyricist Lionel Bart. Geoffrey Rush has just signed on to play Bart in Consider Yourself, and he'll be joined in the cast by Stephen Fry, Olivia Colman, Eddie Marsan, Matt Lucas and Michelle Dockery. Al Weaver will play Bart / Rush as a younger man.Bart's is a rags-to-riches-to-rags story, more or less. From inauspicious beginnings in Stepney, he became one of the most successful songwriters in Britain, despite no formal musical training. Starting out writing pop hits (Cliff Richard's Living Doll was one of Bart's) he eventually moved on to musical theatre, and became the first person ever to have three West End productions running at the same time. Later productions like Twang!
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Consider Yourself (the title comes from one of the best-known songs from Oliver!, Bart’s musical adaptation of Charles Dickens’ Oliver Twist) tells the story of an untrained musician who couldn’t read or write music and yet became the first person to have three West End musicals running. At one point in the early 1960’s, Bart was earning more in song royalties than the Beatles — and still managed to lose it all. The film charts his rise and fall, using Bart’s catalogue of songs,
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Snow White and the Huntsman 2 seemed ridiculous to begin with. It cut out the Snow White part and is simply being called The Huntsman. I mean, that can happen when one of the worst parts of your movie is Snow White herself. But now that the film has a solid release date of April 22, 2016, two more familiar faces revealed they won.t be returning. Actually three, but two of them didn.t really want to be involved.
We.re referring to three of the seven dwarves, the ones played by Simon Pegg.s comedy buddy Nick Frost, Toby Jones of the Captain America films, and Ray Donovan.s Eddie Marsan. Marsan was already unlikely to return because of his television duties, but Deadline reports that the other two did not agree to the terms. Instead the trade states that The Huntsman will only feature three members of the fairy tale
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Forget seven—or eight—dwarves. The follow-up film to Snow White and the Huntsman, will reportedly only have two.
According to Deadline, The Huntsman will only feature two dwarves—the original movie featured eight. Nick Frost, Toby Jones, and Eddie Marsan, all of whom played dwarves in the first film, will not be returning to their roles, Deadline reported. Snow White and the Huntsman was criticized for not casting little people in the film, and instead digitally altering average-height actors.
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In the continuing saga of the sequel no one asked for, The Huntsman will lose more than Snow White and a director. It looks as if many of the dwarfs will be a no-show as well. Word on the street is that two will return, although it's kinda up in the air as to which ones. We do know that Nick Frost, Eddie Marsan and Toby Jones will not be reprising their roles this time around, whether it be due to scheduling or just plain disinterest.
At this point, The Huntsman has little to do
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At this point, watching the development of The Huntsman has become something of a sport. The sequel to 2012’s phenomenally successful Snow White And The Huntsman is now a case-study in what can be achieved when Universal has the commitment of two stars, a confirmed release date, and then just holds on tight.

When the first film opened to great fanfare and financial success, the idea of a sequel was immediately and predictably bandied about. The main cast – Kristen Stewart, Chris Hemsworth and Charlize Theron – was on board and happy to return. Then came a wave of high profile controversy surrounding Stewart and the film’s director, Rupert Sanders – which led to both of them stepping away from the project. But, with Hemsworth and Theron still attached, a release date was set for April 22nd 2016, and attentions turned to the development of a screenplay, without Snow White in it.

Deadline reports that only two of the seven dwarves from the first film will be back, though which dwarves they are is still unclear. Three of them though - actors Nick Frost, Toby Jones and Eddie Marsan - are Not going to return.

Marsan has scheduling conflicts with his role on "Ray Donovan," a reason actor Ian McShane may also skip out on the job. The other two have apparently turned down deals to return.

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